


The Dark Gotham Knight

by LeeMorrigan



Category: DC Extended Universe, DCEU, DCU, The Batman (Movie 2021)
Genre: Batman - Freeform, Bruce and Talia had been a Thing, From the older movie and comics and such, Gotham City - Freeform, Gotham Gazette, I always liked Vicki Vale, I gave her a motorcycle and red hair, I made an amalgamation of Vicki Vale, Just a weird idea that hit me a third of the way into the new trailer, Multi, Multiverse, She does not scream or faint all the time like in the old movie, She is tough and still a trouble magnet, She's a redhead in most of the comics, The Riddler - Freeform, Will touch on Batman and Catwoman having a relationship, league of shadows, penguin - Freeform, trouble magnet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:28:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26297893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeeMorrigan/pseuds/LeeMorrigan
Summary: Bruce Wayne has been doing his masked vigilante thing for nearly two years. He has earned the trust of a select few such as Jim Gordon of the GCPD, and works with them, as well as Alfred and Lucius Fox, to try to clear out the rot in Gotham. Along the way, he must deal with some truly wild villains, a new cat burgler in town, and an old friend who works for the Gotham Gazette.
Relationships: Alfred Pennyworth & Bruce Wayne, Alfred Pennyworth & Lucius Fox, Batman & Catwoman, Bruce Wayne & Lucius Fox, Jim Gordon & Bruce Wayne, Vicki Vale & Alfred Pennyworth, Vicki Vale/Bruce Wayne
Kudos: 5





	1. A Little Light

**Author's Note:**

> Triggers: This is Bruce Wayne- 'childhood trauma' should be his middle name, but basically if you got through the trailer for the new movie and you've gotten through the first Tim Burton/Michael Keaton BATMAN movie, you should be alright with this chapter.
> 
> Notes: Vicki Vale is a redhead in this based on several comics I read as a kid and her personality is a bit tougher/more upbeat than she was in the Tim Burton movie cause I'm taking my cues more from the comics/cartoons over the years. I read some cool ideas about Catwoman having a story arc that leads her away from Gotham after she sees just how crazy the place is and I've read some cool stuff about who all villains we might see, so I'm planning to explore similar ideas. I will not crap on any other versions of Batman, Catwoman, or other DC characters, cause I love them all. Oh, also, I love the way Catwoman was portrayed in the old Adam West-Batman series/movie, so I may borrow some stuff from there.

Gotham City – Almost Two Years Ago

Alfred walked into the kitchen, ready to refill his mug of coffee. He liked tea in the evening when he was winding down from a day’s work and worry, but of a morning- he preferred a good, strong cup of coffee. Or two. Sometimes a whole pot.

Working in a mansion where he was the sole inhabitant, was not exactly exciting or overly laborious. He had jobs he did each week, some seasonal issues to attend, and odd jobs that had long ago been farmed out to paid workers. The lawn was mowed by a service the late Mr.Wayne had employed, the gutters and roof were cared for each spring and autumn by another crew the late Mr.Wayne had selected years ago, and there was a maid service who sent maids out twice a week to clean the bedrooms, hallways, dining room, and entry. The study, kitchen, library, Alfred’s own bedroom, and the family bedrooms were up to Alfred.

It was rather dull, the past few years, with his former ward having departed Gotham in order to seek out something he was missing. Alfred had been half-tempted to tell the young man that his parents were not out there somewhere waiting for him to save them. They had been dead almost twenty years.

Still, Alfred did his best to keep busy. He had a weekly dinner out at a small Italian restaurant he liked in Gotham. He would make an afternoon of it, perusing book shops of his liking, stopping in at an antique shop, then dropping into an old friend’s jewelry shop to chat over tea, before going to enjoy his meal at Oliveria’s. Aside from that, he also had his near-weekly, sometimes more or occasionally less often, checkers games with Victoria Vale. Or, as most of the Gotham Gazette’s readers knew her, Vicki Vale.

Alfred smiled as he thought of her face whenever someone called her Vicki. She hated it. A gift from her biological father that carried over into usage by her teachers, which accounted for how her bosses had come to put that as her official name on everything at the Gazette. She had been a high school senior on an internship, when she first started writing for the Gazette, and as such they had used the name her teachers called her. Now she was simply stuck with it.

Once he had refilled his coffee, Alfred checked his messages. His private cell phone number was known to only a small handful. Most called him on one of the lines to the Wayne manor, either the publicly listed one that rang directly to the kitchen and to the study, or the private, unlisted number that was used primarily by Wayne Enterprises employees and old friends of the Waynes. Less than ten people knew Alfred’s number, and aside from Victoria, they were all related to himself or Master Bruce.

Two messages from his great-niece in England, a message from his cousin in Belgium, and a final message from a blocked number. Alfred read that one first. Blocked numbers, no matter where they traced back to, always belonged to one person. Bruce.

Alfred took a deep breath to steel his nerves, before opening the message. It could be anything from a simple ‘I am well’, to ‘Can you send a wire transfer to a guy so I can get my bike back’, and once he had inquired of a remedy for migraines that Alfred used to give him as a teenager. This time, the message was simple. Six words Alfred had nearly given up hope of.

_Alfred, I’m ready to come home._

The old butler could have done cartwheels. His boy was coming home. Things needed to be done. He would need to air out Bruce’s room, as he was well-aware that Bruce would not stay in the master bedroom that had once belonged to the late Waynes. Alfred would also need to lay in supplies. Master Bruce always had an impressive appetite, and that was before he had been years without some of his favorite food items.

Then another thought came to mind. Bruce was coming home. Gotham, when Thomas Wayne was alive and fighting to improve things, had been a dark and rough city. Thomas’s father had been more interested in profits and influence than philanthropy and his physician son had been an embarrassment to him. When Thomas inherited Wayne Enterprises, he used it to try to fix Gotham. Almost twenty years without Thomas, and all his work had been wiped away, replaced with an even darker Gotham than the one he had inherited.

In the past five years alone, it had grown worse than Alfred could recall it being. When he arrived to look after Thomas Wayne and his new bride, Martha, the city had been bad with a dangerous reputation. Nothing like it had now, however. Even Bruce’s young friend Victoria, had been mugged, had her apartment broken into, and nearly had her motorcycle taken from her by force while she was at a traffic light – and that had all been in the past three years.

Alfred could recall the night she had called, her voice shaky yet still so polite as she asked if she might stay in one of the guest rooms for the night. When Alfred inquired what was wrong and if she was alright, she had filled him in. Her apartment had been broken into, with her walking in on the robbery and getting punched before she broke the arm of one of the robbers, the second getting away. The cops had deemed her apartment a crime scene and allowed her to pack a bag before being evicted until the crime scene people were done.

Alfred, aware how Thomas and Martha would have handled one of Bruce’s friend’s being in need of a safe haven for a few days, had not hesitated to invite her to stay as long as she needed. She stayed three nights, all three of which she tried to cook dinner for him or do things to ‘be useful’. Her knuckles had been bruised from where she fought back and her eye black from the hit that took her by surprise. Her mother had paid for Victoria to take martial arts lessons since she was 8 and she had no issue in making use of those lessons to defend herself. Such stories were normal in Gotham, young women being car jacked, apartment robbed repeatedly, and such.

Gotham was not the shining city upon a hill that Thomas Wayne had dreamed of. This was not the city he wanted to leave for Bruce. Wayne Enterprises wasn’t the philanthropic, benevolent corporation with a heart that it had been under Thomas’s hand. Share-holders had ruined that. Perhaps, now that Master Bruce was to return, he could turn Wayne Enterprises around, restart Thomas and Martha’s old charities, and be an example to the rest of Gotham’s wealthy elite. He could be the kind of man Thomas had been, and whom Martha would have been proud of.

Alfred smiled, thinking of how happy the pair would have been to receive Bruce back after a long time away from home. Of how proud they would be of the kind of man Alfred was sure Bruce would be. As a child, Bruce had been kind and caring, though stubborn and a bit too smart for his own good. Martha claimed the brains and the caring were Thomas all over again. Thomas always argued the kind heart and stubborn nature were all Martha. Alfred agreed with both.

First order of business, Alfred decided, was Master Bruce’s room. It was clean. It needed aired out, the windows pulled to allow some sunshine, and Alfred would put a fresh toothbrush, razer, and everything else a young man needed into the bathroom for Bruce. No doubt Bruce would walk in with only a simple bag that had the most basic necessities. Bruce wasn’t much for luggage. Lucius had once commented that it was probably because Bruce carried so much baggage.

Alfred shook his head, dispelling too many thoughts that ganged up on him. He had work to do. Master Bruce was coming home. Finally.

-^-^-^-^-^-

Gotham – Present Day

Batman studied the note in Det.Gordon’s hand. The Riddler. This was his third strike in as many weeks and they were no closer to catching him than they had been a month ago. The victim’s face was still covered crudely in duct tape, though his hands had been left free, making a finger print scan easy. The identification of the victim was not in question, only the reason why the Riddler had chosen him.

“If you come up with anything, you’ll let me know?”, Gordon asked, once the other cops were back with the body and he was alone with Batman.

The Batman nodded. Gordon wasn’t always so sure about this guy. A weird guy in a suit with a dangerous skillset, was not exactly novel in Gotham City these days. There was a guy who dressed like scarecrow terrorizing the citizenship a few months back, and there had been a team who dressed like a deck of cards. Weirdo bad guys in freakish costumes were a dime a dozen in this city. But not the man in front of him.

The Batman, as the newspapers had dubbed him after a few low-level creeps were interviewed about the Batman showing up on rooftops and back alleys, had seemed intent on hunting the criminal element. To make them as afraid of him as the city was of the criminals. From what Gordon had seen so far, it was working. Even the cops were nervy around the caped crusader of Gotham.

Sometimes, Jim tried to figure the guy out. From what little he could see of the guy’s face, he didn’t seem terribly old. Later 20s to mid-30s, Jim had guessed. Tall, enough so that Jim had to look up a bit to talk to him, so no less than 6ft. Muscled enough to do the kind of damage he did to punks who were stupid enough to take him on. Skilled enough to dodge most blows, evade the police most of the time, and operate in the shadows where the scariest citizens of Gotham thrived. Young, tall, physically fit, deadly, and highly intelligent. Aside from the last two, that could have described a few hundred people. The last two didn’t narrow it enough for Jim to have a short list of suspects for the Batman’s true identity.

Until such time as the Batman harmed anyone who wasn’t a criminal preying on an innocent citizen, Jim Gordon was inclined to leave the matter alone. He did like to know just enough to make quick work of finding Batman, should the day come with the masked vigilante became a problem. He wouldn’t have been the first guardian angel to end up falling in with the devils.

“We should have the crime scene report back in a couple days. There’s a lot here to sort through. I’ve got some known associates I’ll take a run at, see if I can dig anything up.”

The Batman nodded again. One of the crime scene techs waved to get Gordon’s attention. They needed him to move out of their light. He stepped off, then turned back to the Batman and found the corner his masked associate had been in was now vacant.

“He always does that.”, Jim groused before turning back to his crime scene.

-^-^-^-^-^-

Bruce pulled his bike into the little garage out back of the house. It had a small tunnel, of sorts, that was only half-buried and lead directly to the wine cellar below the kitchen. As a kid, Bruce used to sneak down to the wine cellar when playing hide-and-seek with his mom. For a long time, he couldn’t figure out how she always found him when he watched the door from the kitchen. It had not been until after she died and he had been in the smaller garage where his dad had kept the prized motorcycle he rarely rode, that Bruce found the back door of the garage with a tunnel leading to the cellar and kitchen.

Bike secured, Batman gear tucked away into the backpack he carried, Bruce made his way to the kitchen. Alfred always had some food waiting for him and would be happy to see Bruce had come back uninjured. The first few weeks of this Batman thing had seen Bruce returning to the manor with a wide array of wounds. Alfred’s least-favorite had been the barb wire that was still attached to Bruce’s lower leg.

From the stairs in the cellar, Bruce could smell grilled cheese and tomato soup. Not what he had been expecting, although not surprising given the weather. Gloomy and wet, had been Alfred’s exact words when he looked out the window earlier.

Bruce had barely gotten the door open when Alfred walked into the kitchen with a tray. Tea pot, two cups on saucers, milk, creamer, sugar, and two plates where he had split an English treat whose name made Americans giggle. Victoria. Only one person would come this late and Alfred would roll out his favorite treat and some Irish breakfast tea, for the guest.

“How are you, Master Bruce?”

“One functional, wound-free piece. Where’s Vic?”

“The study. She fell asleep while waiting for you. Didn’t even wake when I came in to get the tray from earlier.”

That seemed curious. Victoria was a sound sleeper, though she rarely fell asleep while in Alfred’s company. She was usually too busy playing checkers or teasing with him.

“Is she sick or something? Her apartment didn’t get broken into again?”

Alfred waved him off.

“I left her in order to take a call from Wayne Enterprises. Don’t worry, sir, I told them you were on a date and had neglected to take your phone before you left. However, by the time I returned, I believe the warmth of the fireplace after our tea and her ride over here on her bike, was too tempting and she fell asleep on that old leather sofa.”

Bruce nodded, dropping his bag to the floor. As a kid, he used to fall asleep there all the time. Of course, when he had been that small, his dad used to carry him back to bed and tuck him in so Bruce would wake in his own room. It had been like magic.

“When did she get here?”

“A little after eleven. She’s as aware as I, that you’re not inclined to early bedtimes.”

Bruce almost smiled at the small teasing. Snagging a fresh cup of coffee, he headed for the study. The halls were still decorated with paintings his mom had picked out. Over the years he was in college, his dad’s old secretary- Esmerelda, used to try to talk Bruce into redecorating. She thought fresh paint and new pictures would make the place more ‘homey’ and less of a reminder to Bruce.

There had been times he had been tempted to gut the place and have it completely renovated. To obliterate any and all traces of his parents and his childhood. Most days, he found his mom’s favorite paintings and his dad’s old books to be a comfort. A reminder that they had been real, not some elaborate dream he had held onto.

The study was probably the one room that he used a lot, that had changed the least. His parents’ bedroom was basically a shrine- left untouched, aside from Alfred dusting and cleaning, since his parents’ death, being the least-used and the only unchanged room. The study still had all of Thomas’s medical books and Martha’s art books, there was still a pair of shelves that held all the children’s books his parents used to read to him, and a shelf of all the books his mom bought him in anticipation of his reaching an age where he could read and appreciate them.

The same sturdy, antique furniture stood in nearly the same placement as when it had been primarily Thomas’s work room. Same rugs. Same tools by the fireplace. Same blue curtains draped at the window. It now had books on engineering, physics, poisons, toxins, weapons, tactics, psychology, criminology, crime scene investigation, and other useful topics for a vigilante in Gotham. And, due entirely to the years Bruce had been gone and Victoria had been one of the extremely rare guests at Wayne manor for her weekly checkers game with Alfred, there was an entire bookshelf of photography, architecture, ethics in journalism, and Gotham history.

As Bruce entered, he caught himself smiling slightly at the view he found. Victoria’s dark red hair braided over her shoulder and catching the firelight, her glasses askew on her nose, her bright blue athletic hoodie riding up slightly to expose half an inch of pale flesh above her black jeans, gray striped socks peaking out from where she dropped her boots next to her helmet by the corner of the sofa, a book in her hand, her cell phone forgotten on the coffee table. Upon closer inspection, he found what he expected. Victoria’s glasses were in need of cleaning and her keys were in her helmet.

She had worn glasses since long before Bruce met her, 14 years ago, and still preferred them to contacts. She rarely wore makeup, she practically lived on her motorcycle when the weather permitted, and if he looked, he was sure he’d find her camera bag at the front door with her camera, extra memory cards, some lenses, and other gear all safely tucked inside. She was one of the few people Bruce could name who even owned a film camera, and she knew how to develop her own photos from black and white film. ‘An expensive hobby’, as she referred to it.

Bruce moved, setting his coffee mug aside before looking at her face one more time. She always looked so peaceful in sleep, quieter than she was when awake. When she was awake, her mind was always going and her smile was near-constant.

“Victoria.”, he called softly, not wishing to startle her awake.

She did not stir.

“Victoria.”, he tried, a bit louder.

Nothing.

“Victoria. Victoria.”, he tried, with an added gentle tap on her forearm.

Her eyes came open, dark green that looked almost black in the firelight. They moved around a bit, unfocused, before meeting Bruce’s own gaze. Her dark pink lips spread into a soft smile. He watched as she stretched her arms over her head and arched her back, emitting a snap and then a crack, before straightening.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to sleep. I wanted to be awake when you got home.”

She was unaware he was Batman, though Bruce suspected she was under the impression he was in league with the Batman.

“It’s alright. After Alfred’s tea and British delicacies, no one’s alertness is safe.”

She smiled at the joke, sitting up to allow Bruce space on the sofa where her legs had been. Her mile-long legs that had been rather spindly 14 years ago and were now well muscled and shapely enough to drive a lot of men nuts.

“I blame this sofa. It’s entirely too comfortable. Maybe it was enchanted by the sand man.”

Bruce nodded.

“Alfred and I have both fallen asleep on it enough times for that to be a likely conclusion. So, what errand brings you so late? You didn’t have someone try to steal your bike again?”

She shook her head, yawning against the back of her hand before looking back, more alert and her eyes brighter.

“Nothing like that. You and Alfred are such alarmists. No. Actually I come bearing an invite to an exceedingly boring event.”

“Mh-hmm.”

“My brother is getting married, as I’ve mentioned, and they want to have kind of a pre-wedding dinner here, to let everyone get a chance to meet the bride and her family, before they head back to Ontario to do the actual wedding and all that. Her parents and sisters will be coming down, my dad’s family will all be there.”

“Your brother has spoken to me four, perhaps five times.”

“Oh, he’s not inviting you. Besides, he won’t really remember half of the people there. When he got that scholarship, he left Gotham like his feet were on fire. Honestly, if our father hadn’t made such a fuss, Danny wouldn’t have brought Neesha down to meet us. No, I’m asking you so that way I’ll have someone there who I can actually like to talk to, besides the Bride-to-be.”

Bruce couldn’t have resisted her if he had wanted to. He was aware Victoria and her father had nothing like an ideal father-daughter relationship. Nor did she and the middle of her three brothers, enjoy a close bond. The eldest of her brothers had always been her best friend, champion, and shoulder to cry on. The youngest of the three was a free-spirit who would have dropped everything in a flash for Victoria, if she asked him to. Unfortunately for her, none of her brothers lived within 100 miles of Gotham.

“Give Alfred the time and day, and he’ll make sure I don’t forget when it is.”

“He already had me get him up to speed, I just felt like I should ask you instead of having Alfred force you.”

“While I appreciate it, Alfred would never have let me leave you to it.”

She nodded, still smiling, a slight blush coloring the apples of her cheeks.

“Sorry. He is just too good at getting info out of people. Are you sure he wasn’t British Intelligence before he was a butler? Or do they teach espionage at Butler school?”

“My dad used joke that he hired him away from the double-O program.”

That earned a snort of laughter from Victoria. Bruce felt a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, despite how tired he was and how busy his mind had been until he realized Victoria was here. Sometimes he thought she and Alfred were the only ones left who could make him smile without trying.

“Bruce?”

He looked up at her, seeing her dark eyes looking over his face. She looked worried.

“What’s going on in there?”, she asked as she pointed to his temple, then pushed a lock of his hair back away from his face.

“What makes you think something is going on?”

“Your sad look.”

“I was smiling.”

“Yes, after I got to talking, but before, when I first woke up. You had your look that means you’re thinking about things that would concern a head shrink or a school counselor.”

“And what expression is that, exactly?”

She shook her head, arching one dark red eyebrow over her plastic framed black glasses.

“And reveal your tell, thus eliminating it? Have you met me, Bruce?”

He let out a long breath as he looked over to the small fire Alfred had going.

“It was worth a try.”

She nodded, turning to look at the fire as well, letting her head rest against Bruce’s shoulder.

“Nice deflection.”

“Don’t worry, Vic. It’s nothing.”

“Nuh-uh.”

He turned his head to look at her, though at this angle he mostly saw her forehead and hair.

“I’ve known you for a minute or two. Tell me what’s wrong or tell me it’s none of my business, but don’t say it’s nothing.”

Bruce sometimes forgot how bossy his best friend was, though he appreciated it about her. Anyone less bossy would have abandoned him a long time ago. She was stubborn, tough, and smart. All things he valued in a friend.

Allowing his own head to lean against hers, his arm moving into a loose hold around her back, Bruce settled a bit. He wasn’t sure what to say.

“I can’t promise I’ll always have the answer, but I might make for a good sounding board, at least.”

“It’s a business thing. A very boring, if irritating, business thing.”

“Ah, so it’s like stocks and money. Math stuff. I get why you didn’t ask me, you know what my math grades were like.”

Bruce nodded.

“Not to mention, I know math makes you snore. Come on. Alfred made tomato soup and grilled cheese.”

“What? Why didn’t you open with that? We’d be eating already! Come on. Let’s go help set the table.”

She stood, maneuvering Bruce’s arm to tug him up with her and tow him to the kitchen. He put up no resistance, just followed along back to the kitchen. Alfred had laid out the silverware and such, only the food remained to be served.

“I’ll get that, you two sit down.”, Bruce offered, as he moved to pull Victoria’s chair out. Alfred had always insisted Bruce maintain his manners.

“Alright, Master Bruce. But don’t spill on my clean stove.”

“Yes, sir.”, Bruce said with only a small bit of teasing in his tone.

In a minute, he had the food plated and was serving it to Alfred and Victoria, taking a moment in his head to appreciate this. For the years he had been gone, traveling the world, ‘gallivanting’- according to the press, he had lived in near isolation from affection and warmth. There had been a woman, a brief flash of time, where he enjoyed a closeness before she shut him out.

Bruce moved to sit across from Victoria, to Alfred’s right, seeing that Alfred was already sipping some soup up from his wide spoon and Victoria was taking a generous bite of her sandwich. Alfred made no secret how he worried what the whole Batman thing might do to Bruce’s mind. However, so long as he could have these moments, Bruce was fairly certain he would be no worse for the wear.

“Did I ever tell you the story about when I tried to teach Master Bruce to ride a horse?”, Alfred ventured to Victoria.

Her eyes lit up as she looked at Alfred, then over to Bruce with an evil smirk growing on her face.

“You have not.”

Bruce hid his face behind a hand, groaning into his palm. This only spurred Alfred on. The butler began recounting the story that Bruce knew would end with Alfred being led on horseback to the house, with a broken arm. It was one of his favorite stories.


	2. Anniversaries and Adversaries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A familiar foe realizes he's on the radar of more than one masked figure in Gotham, Victoria tries to make a bad anniversary a little less lonely, a certain burglar reminds The Batman that her offer still stands, and Alfred takes care of the kids.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warning: Mentions lingering PTSD issues from walking in on a burglary, lingering mental health issues stemming from the loss of parents in childhood (this is Bruce "childhood trauma" Wayne here), mourning, healthy and unhealthy methods of dealing with grief, nightmares mentioned but not shown, allusions made about the terrible things a reporter has seen in Gotham when witnesses/etc. turn up dead.
> 
> Notes: I looked up some various stuff about the exact details of the Wayne murders to try to have one story I stick with about what happened to Bruce's parents. I also have stuff in here that's familiar if you've seen the Tim Burton Batman movies, the Nolan-verse films, and some comic book stuff. (Full disclosure, the Michael Keaton/Tim Burton Batman movie is my favorite of the big screen adaptations, Affleck's is my second-favorite version.) Again, I pulled from various comics over the years, to get stuff about Vicki Vale, including that she's a red-head. I did make up the bit about her riding & loving motorcycles. Also, the community theatre group mentioned is fictional, but based off two similar groups I know about from real life.

Batman watched the cat burglar at her work. She was skilled and quick. The offices she was in would get her killed if she were caught by the owner.

For several weeks now, he had been tracking her movements. Their interactions had been… fascinating, and aggravating. Maddening, at times. Bruce had expected a direct fight or perhaps some attempt at seduction. He had not expected her to flee, then pop back up the next evening at the house.

Moving carefully, Batman came to her side of the street and entered through the back. They had met twice before. And she had figured out Batman and Bruce Wayne were one and the same, thanks to an injury he had as Batman that bled through his shirt when he was Bruce Wayne leaving a funeral.

“You going to loom over there all night like Dracula, or are you going to try to stop me?”, she said as she looked back over her shoulder, a slight smirk on her face.

“If Grissom catches you in here, he’ll have you killed.”

She shrugged one shoulder, nonplussed.

“Girl’s gotta eat.”

“Hmm.”

She plucked whatever item she desired from the safe, tucking it into her satchel before turning to face Batman fully. He noticed she had left the safe hanging wide open.

“If you want to call one of your little police men up here, you can say you found it open. Still plenty in there for them to squander on a prosecution that won’t amount to anything. Assuming you even get honest cops.”

He moved closer, inspecting the inside of the safe. Grissom was old-school. No computers, no smart phones, no smart watches, no security systems with passcodes. His men were given instructions verbally in crowded places where Grissom and his top lieutenants had private rooms reserved for their use. He still kept things in a physical safe that was guarded by thugs on each floor.

Selina prowled over to Batman, running her claw-like fingernail across where his clavicle would be, her dark eyes watching Bruce.

“Did you consider my offer? Could really use somebody with your skills.”

“I’ve work enough in Gotham.”

She sighed, dropping her hand as she slinked off.

“I might have known. You’re such a bore, Batman. I expected someone more…”, she trailed off as she slinked towards the window, “well _more_.”

Once she reached the window, she turned back to smile.

“Better luck next time, Bat.”

She did a backflip, to show off he was sure, for her exit. He sighed. Selina was an intriguing puzzle. Doubly so because she wanted to play as much as Bruce desired to decipher her.

Looking back at the safe, he figured he should check it for anything useful. He might also take a stab at figuring out what Selina had taken out of there. She had been collecting info on Grissom’s personal finances for weeks. Whatever she had in mind, it clearly was not something she intended to turn over to the GCPD.

~^~^~^~^~^~

Alfred sighed. The home-gym that constituted one-fifth of the Batman’s lair, was a slovenly mess. An empty pizza box sat greasy atop a standing desk with Bruce’s computer array. Several cups, classes, and mugs lay about empty and collecting dust. Then, there was the matter of the sweat-soaked clothes littering the backs of chairs and the horizontal bars of his various pieces of equipment he used to beat his body into fighting shape.

Over in the corner that was more dedicated to perfecting the suit, it looked entirely different. Everything in its place, everything tidy. All sharp lines of glass top tables, sleek black leather desk chairs, rectangular computer monitors, and neat script on handwritten notes.

In an area off to the far-right from the stairs leading down into the place, there was a comfortable, battered leather sofa, old wooden bookshelves filled with various books and knickknacks, and a single sweater hanging from a hat rack’s sturdiest hook. It was almost homey. The three areas made Alfred think of the various sides of his former ward.

The erratic, wild, unleashed part of him that was the man he saw when he encountered this Batman figure. Bruce punished his body, suffered it to bend into the form of a frightening vigilante. Forcing the naturally slim, lanky build into a more solid, sturdy tool.

The perfectly controlled, tidy, professional visage Bruce presented to the shareholders, reporters, board members, and lawyers that looked to the Wayne Heir. This was the man that the press saw the most of, ever since he had been a teenager. Bruce had turned his façade into an art form, as skillfully pulling up his mask as if he were a thespian actor from Julliard.

Then, that space that only Alfred, Lucious, and Victoria got to see. The one who walked around the mansion with bed-head, eating cereal out of a soup mug, whilst reading the financial times and various small local papers with more varied staff writers. If the world saw The Batman and The Billionaire, the select few Bruce trusted, got to see the real Bruce.

Alfred worried every day for his former ward. Bruce was not a child anymore, yet even childhood had offered little protection for the Wayne heir. The press had hounded him in the wake of his parents’ death, a criminal had shot his parents right in front of their little boy, and predatory members of the board had bullied shareholders into letting them run things how they pleased rather than safeguarding it for the day Bruce was old enough to take the reins.

Quietly, Alfred began to pick up the trash and place items into their proper spots. Bruce might not mind the mess, Alfred did. The other two-fifths of this lair were the command center and repair garage. Those two were his domain. Bruce built, retooled, and designed his suit, gear, and vehicles, Alfred repaired the vehicles and kept an eye out for Bruce when he was out on his patrols.

Once the lair was suitably clean, Alfred refilled the small fridge with fruit, vegetables, milk, eggs, and mayo. The makings for breakfasts, quick snacks, and midnight dinners. It almost felt like Bruce’s college years all over.

Alfred had just finished with the fridge when his mobile rang. The ringtone indicated it was a call from Bruce.

“Think of the devil.”, Alfred joked as he reached to pull the phone from his inner vest pocket.

“Yes, Master Bruce?”

“I’ll be in late. No Batman tonight, unless an emergency comes up.”

“Alright. Would you like me to leave a dinner in the fridge or will you be dining out?”

“Dining out, but thanks, Alfred.”

“Very good, sir. Enjoy.”

He heard the near-chuckle. What the old butler wouldn’t give to have Bruce laugh and smile the way he had in childhood. The way Thomas and Martha both always had.

“Goodnight, Alfred.”

“G’night, sir.”

~^~^~^~^~^~

Victoria listened to the radio as settled her groceries into their proper locations. Milk in the fridge and bread in the bin as she heard the news anchor recount Batman’s dealings last night. It seemed there had been a break-in he had been too late to stop. The news people repeated the theory from the cops, that Batman had actually done the breaking in to get information on a suspected mobster.

Allegedly, there had been evidence of the mobster’s dirty deals with local politicians, dirty cops, and extortions he was running on the local business owners to make them cut him in on their profits. When they mentioned the name of the alleged mobster, Victoria barked a laugh.

“Suspected mobster my foot. Grissom is rotten to the core and sharp as a tack.”

A knocking at her door drew Victoria’s attention. First, she checked that her taser-umbrella was in reach and she grabbed it, then she flipped the cover off her peephole and used her smart phone to take a photo of who was on the other side. Ever since she watched a horror film with her brother where a screwdriver came through a peephole, she hated to use them.

She checked her phone. It was blurry but she recognized the face just as she heard the muffled voice from the other side of the door.

“Vic, let me in before Mrs.Peters sees me.”

Bruce.

“Aw come on,” Victoria started as she opened the door, “she thinks you’d be perfect for her niece over in Chicago.”

Bruce shook his head with a barely audible growl as he walked into her apartment. That’s when she noticed the large, brown paper bag in his hand.

“Is that what I think it is?”

“Depends. If you think it’s a dinosaur, I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed.”

She pointed a finger up at him, her other hand resting on her hip.

“Hey, I’ll have you know that for a nine-year-old kid, that was a big deal to find a dinosaur bone in her own yard. Now come back to the kitchen with me. Bring your bribe and get some plates. I’m putting my groceries away.”

“Bribe?”, he inquired as he slipped out of his long coat.

“If you bring Tilly’s Treasures, it means you’re in a foul mood and want to eat shrimp and watch old movies with your best friend. When you bring Elias’s chicken shistawook on rice, with a generous side of tabbulleah for me, and the tahini and lamb gyro for yourself, it means you want something.”

“Perhaps I simply wished to improve your disposition before I asked a favor?”

“Pretty sure that’s one of the definitions of Bribe, although I’m not Websters.”, she said as she put away the frozen dinners she had gotten on special.

Bruce moved to get plates, silverware, and glasses while she finished up with her groceries. It struck her as a bit funny. Here was Bruce Wayne, golden boy and top bachelor of Gotham City, in his expensive, tailored suit, moving about her tiny kitchen, while she put away groceries in her battered blue jeans, faded band shirt, old sweater, and bare feet. They would seem an odd pair if someone were to walk in and find them, yet it felt normal to have Bruce sharing her space.

“What do you need?”

“An alibi.”

That got her attention. She spun back to face Bruce.

“Pardon?”

“Well, more an excuse though it may well end up serving much the same purpose. There is a function I’m expected to attend, as Mr.Wayne of Wayne Enterprises and, I really can’t go.”

“Can’t, or really don’t want to?”

She watched Bruce’s face. A certain look flickered across it. Moving closer, Victoria put a hand on his upper arm, slowly rubbing up and down. Bruce wouldn’t meet her eyes.

“Bruce, why do you need an alibi to avoid an event? Can’t you just claim you have an important business meeting in London? Or New York?”

The tightness of his shoulders and thin line of his lips told her this was something more personal than he cared to admit. Whatever he would tell her would likely be only half the story. Still, she waited. Bruce opened up on his own time table.

Victoria backed off and put the last grocery item away, then stepped over towards the bar that constituted her dining room table. Her apartment was pretty nice, for her pay grade in Gotham City. A small bedroom with attached bath, a living space, and small eat-in kitchen, with a fire escape that served as a small balcony.

When she moved in months ago, Bruce had teased her that she ought to have rented some cute loft space where she could hang a curtain to designate a bedroom area and the kitchen could be a fridge next to a shelf that held her microwave, toaster, and blender. Sometimes, especially when she had to babysit her building’s super as he did the monthly apartment check, she considered Bruce’s idea.

Bruce pulled her chair for her as she got the bar. Considering the kind of manners Alfred displayed and his reactions to any lapse in Bruce’s manners, Victoria would bet good money Bruce’s own good manners were muscle memory at this point. No conscious thought required, for him to get a lady’s chair or hold a door.

“There is a charity, my mother was one of the heads of it… when I was a child, and every September they have a charity auction.”

He reached, sipping the cola she had offered to go with dinner. Victoria chewed some of her chicken and waited.

“I don’t wish to be part of the auction this year. Last year was bad enough.”

“Wait, is this the one for the hospital, and they do the Bachelor Auction for dates with some of the more desirable eligible men of Gotham?”

He nodded, a miserable expression on his face. Victoria fought back a chuckle. She recalled Alfred recounting the date Bruce had gone on with his highest bidder. She had been in her early 20s and spent the entire ‘date’ gushing over how jealous her friends back at her prestigious college would be, and trying to take selfies with Bruce.

“Just tell them you have to be in New York that night.”

“They want to auction me in absentia.”

“Ew.”, Victoria responded with a grimace.

“Precisely.”

Bruce stabbed at his meat before piling it onto his pita.

“Alright, I’ll cover you. Anyone asks, we’re doing a three-part series and therefor I have dibs on your free time when you aren’t at Wayne Enterprises, traveling abroad for work, or stuck in various meetings to run all the foundations and such.”

“Thank you.”

Victoria got up, moving to where her cell was still tucked away in her satchel. She pulled up her calendar app and flipped to September.

“When is it?”

“September the twenty-fifth.”

Even as she typed the details and a reminder of what she was supposed to say if asked, the date tickled her memory. She hit SAVE, then saw a gray stripe already on that date. She checked, fearing some conflict.

‘ _Anniversary – check on Bruce and Alfred._ ’, then an emoji of a fading rose. Now she remembered. The Waynes had been slain on September twenty-fifth, a little over twenty years ago.

“By the look on your face, I will assume you’ve done some math.”

“You know I hate math.”, she said almost as a reflex before putting her phone away and returning to the bar.

She noticed Bruce was nolonger eating, but merely picking at his food. He loved the lamb gyros from Elias’s. Aside from the occasional pepperoni pizzas with her, the gyros were about the only thing he ate and enjoyed, that weren’t Health Food. To see him not absolutely diving into them was proof enough of his internal churning.

Victoria reached over, laying a hand on Bruce’s thigh. He went still. His intense blue eyes were hyper focused on his plate yet he seemed to be totally unaware of its presence. Two breaths later, he looked almost normal and was back to fixing himself a pita full of meat and tzatiki sauce.

Victoria retracted her hand and went back to her own meal. They finished the meal in near-silence before Bruce helped her clean up. Victoria had to answer a phone call from her boss halfway through washing the dishes. Bruce waved her off and went to washing instead of drying.

When Victoria returned, the dishes were done and Bruce was sitting on her beat up couch, his shoes, tie, and jacket gone. He looked tired. No, weary was the word. Tired didn’t make him seem like his shoulders ached and his eyes have a slight redness in the whites of them.

Victoria decided to leave her boss’s obsession over the past four months with The Cat Burglar alone for the night, and settled onto the couch with Bruce. He had one of her throw pillows behind the small of his back to be a lumbar support. Victoria pulled up the second pinkish-purple pillow behind her head and propped her bare feet onto the edge of her coffee table.

Without a word, Bruce brought up the next-to-latest episode of their show. Victoria was content to wait him out. There was something weighing on Bruce. More so than usual. He would talk when he was ready, she mentally reminded herself, adding to her mental note that pushing him just made him dig his heels in.

Neither spoke until the credits were rolling for the episode of their show. Victoria had waited quietly, fighting every urge she had to sleep. Last night, her nightmares had been especially vivid and grueling, leaving her tired and out of sorts all day today. Her pride dictated that she did not want to have one of those nightmares with an audience.

“This will be the twenty-fifth anniversary of their murder.”

That hit like a mac truck. She reached, catching Bruce’s right hand, intertwining her fingers with his. When she had been upset as a kid, her grandfather had done the same and it always helped her calm down.

“The twenty-first was the worst so far, you would think I would be accustomed to this by now.”

“Why was the twenty-first the worst?”

Bruce looked away, towards her window and fire escape. Victoria wondered if he was desiring to jump out and fly to safety or he merely didn’t want to look at her while he talked.

“It meant I had been three times as long without them as I had been with them.”

Seven years old. A long while back, Victoria had helped clean out the office of a fellow at the Gotham Gazette. He had been retiring and had boxes full of old papers he had edited the photos for, back in the day. At the top of one box, Victoria had found the Gotham Gazette’s first story about the brutal slaying of Gotham’s favorite couple.

Under the big letters of the headline had been a single photo. A police officer whose face was darkened at the edge of the photo, holding the little hand of a blank-faced child with brown hair and bright, vacant blue eyes. Victoria had interviewed enough crime victims and witnesses to know shock when she saw it.

Ever since then, when someone was dismissive about Billionaire Bruce Wayne behaving in some way they found unbecoming, or the rag magazines said nasty things about his sanity, all she could think of was that image of the shell-shocked little boy being led away from the dead bodies of his parents.

“Don’t pity me, Victoria.”

“I’m not.”

“Why so silent, then?”, he challenged with his tone, even as his face remained blank.

Victoria turned on the sofa, looking more directly at Bruce. She kept her fingers intertwined with his.

“It isn’t pity, Bruce. It hurts to think of what you’ve been through. You’re my friend, the idea of you being in pain, physical or otherwise, cuts at me. I never want to see a friend hurting, okay. But it isn’t pity.”

Bruce nodded, some of the warmth reappearing back into his blue eyes. He gave her hand a squeeze where she was still holding onto his fingers.

“I’m sorry. Thank you.”

She nodded. Bruce’s moods could shift faster than the wind at sea, yet she was accustomed to it. Alfred had taken Bruce to a lot of professionals to help him process his grief and trauma, yet the fractures were still there.

“Mind if I come over? We can order pizza, or I can bring something? Alfred and I can pick our game back up and you can read over in the corner or… something.”

“You don’t actually have to come stay with us, neither Alfred or I will be very good company.”

“No other place I’d rather be that day.”, she answered.

“Where’s the remote?”, Bruce asked as he looked around the now-darkened room.

Victoria looked, seeing where she had laid it in the little chair beside her and accidentally put the third throw pillow on top of it. She reached, getting it, then handing it to Bruce.

“Sorry, been misplacing stuff all day. Didn’t sleep well last night, I guess.”

“Nightmares?”, Bruce asked as he flipped over to an old favorite movie they both enjoyed.

Victoria shrugged. She had nightmares on and off sometimes, though after coming home to find robbers in her apartment and getting punched by one of them, her nightmares had become a bit more vivid. Bruce was aware of most of that.

What Bruce didn’t know, and she was determined to keep tucked away, was that she had nightmares every time something he did ended up on the front page. When she would see The Batman in the headline, reading details about his fighting a whole group of gang members, a slew of mobsters, or a nest of dirty cops with their co-conspirators, she always ended up waking in a cold sweat, shaking from her latest nightmare. Victoria had seen a few bodies in her time as a reporter, and she knew of the kind of viciousness the bad guys in Gotham were capable of inflicting on a good guy.

Bruce shifted a bit, till his shoulder was touching hers, both of them still facing the TV. The opening credits played, reminding Victoria of all the times they had watched this movie together in the years before Bruce disappeared to travel the world and find himself. He brought her out of her thoughts as his arm moved to tuck her in closer, his hand resting on her elbow, with his thumb trailing softly across the end of her forearm.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Maybe later. I’d rather concentrate on how much I love this movie, and how comfortable your shoulder is.”, she added the last part with a small grin as she let her head fall against his shoulder.

“How was work?”, she asked.

“Boring.”, he said as he let out a snort, “I am taking a meeting with some guys from the Parisian office next week, and the following week there are three representatives from a company in Greece, that handles some of the supply for a new thing we’re doing out there way.”

“Nice.”

“Boring.”

Victoria let out a light chuckle. Bruce looked over at her, arching an eyebrow slightly.

“I was trying not to rub it in.”

Bruce nodded, turning back to the TV. Victoria noted that he looked more relaxed now, and it wasn’t just the lack of a tie or shoes. However, she could still see the storm clouds in his eyes from the discussion of the real reason he wished to duck the Bachelor Auction.

Halfway through the movie, they were now leaning towards each other with a bowl of dark chocolate covered pretzel thins between them. Bruce had rolled up his sleeves and Victoria had peeled off her socks and hoodie.

“Do you want to talk about those nightmares?”, came Bruce’s soft question.

Victoria sighed. There was no way he would entirely let it drop. Truthfully, she did want to talk though she knew she couldn’t say it all. Bruce didn’t know she was aware he was the Batman, and she intended to keep it that way. Knowing Bruce, there was a very real chance he would shut her out if he realized she knew.

“Short version?”

He gave a nod for her to go ahead.

“There are things I see in the newspaper work sometimes, that trigger up some nightmares about bad things happening to the people I care about. It happens often enough that I’m kind of used to it.

“Why haven’t you said anything?”, he asked in genuine concern she could hear in his low tone.

She shrugged.

“You can’t fight the monsters in my head, Bruce.”

He nudged her shoulder with his own, looking very directly down at her face.

“I can try.”

Reaching, Victoria smiled as she ruffled his long, dark locks in her fingers. His hair was so soft. Most of the girls she worked with or had known in school, would have killed for hair as soft as Bruce’s.

“Don’t worry, I’m tougher than I look.”

Bruce moved out of her reach to get her to leave his hair alone. She had been messing with his hair for almost their whole friendship. It never failed to bring a hint of a smile to Bruce’s lips.

“All the same,” he said as he sat up straighter, “even if it’s 5AM when they strike you hard, you can call me. I don’t mind.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. What about you?”

He arched his eyebrow again.

“What about me?”

“Wanna talk about the real reason for those dark circles and sore shoulders?”

“Not really.”

She nodded. Victoria figured she would wait Bruch out instead. She reached for another pretzel with one hand, her other moving to turn off the lamp beside the sofa. They knew where the pretzels were and didn’t need the lights.

Victoria pondered over what Bruce had said earlier. Twenty-five years since he had first lost his parents. That was a whole lifetime.

Twenty-five years ago, she had been learning to write her name prettily. Bruce would have been a happy, well-loved seven-year-old, blissfully unaware he would soon be an orphan. Victoria couldn’t imagine going a full week without being able to call her mom because she had a bad day or wanted to share good news.

As much as her heart had broken for the boy in that old photograph, his hand held by a cop and his eyes blank in shock, her heart ached more for the grown man beside her. At their age, he should have been talking to his dad for advice with women and still getting spoiled by his mom cooking him his favorite meal whenever he came over. He shouldn’t be getting through on his own, and having to visit old graves to be physically near what remained of his parents.

“There’s going to be an antique car and motorcycle show next weekend. Wanna go drool over corvettes with me?”, she asked as she noticed Bruce drifting off into his own mind a little too much.

He nodded.

“I could do that.”

“Good. I’ll make a note in my phone.”

“What would you do without it?”, he asked.

Victoria recognized the slight teasing in his tone. He was coming out of his funk of believing she pitied him.

“Probably end up with nothing in my fridge or freezer, half of my articles sitting half-finished in my laptop, with past-due notices for most of my bills, and my brothers all yelling about something.”

He smiled. No doubt that her words were true, as he had known her long enough to remember when she had a second-hand RadioShack brand PDA with a missing H-key. Back then, she often forgot items, was late or early for events, and lost track of where she left her directions for how to get to someplace she needed to be for an interview.

“How many Ducati motorcycles will be at this show?”, he asked to keep the safer topic going.

Victoria tilted her head to the side, the left corner of her mouth twisting up as she tried to remember. Bruce would never tire of asking random things to induce her making that face. So many people either schooled their features for Mr.Wayne or debutant-types who put on their cute but blank face for Bachelor Bruce, it was refreshing to be around Victoria’s easy-going, expressive, mostly-unschooled face.

She did have a poker face, when need be, but as his friend she rarely used it on him. No one could work her job as successfully as she did, without an excellent ability to police their facial expressions, tone, and word choice. Victoria swam with the sharks at work and came out holding their teeth on a necklace.

“I think there should be at least a dozen, maybe as many as 20, judging by the names of who all is involved.”

Bruce nodded. Ducati was not his favorite, though he did like them. Victoria’s bike, purchased secondhand from a guy she knew in college, was a 2010 Ducati. Custom paint job, matching helmet.

“They will have an aston martin.”, she said with a naughty grin as she walked back into the room with her cell, quickly returning her attention to the movie.

Perhaps, he thought as he noticed she had become fixed on figuring out where she knew the one actor in an ad was from, Bruce considered that he ought to tell her the truth. He was Batman. Simple. He could just say, ‘Vic, I’m the Batman.’, and be done with the secrets.

Four words. One sentence. It should have been simple, yet Bruce knew why it wasn’t.

Knowing would put her in even more danger than she was between her job and being the friend of Bruce Wayne. As a kid, he could recall a time when their cook had been attacked because some crooks wanted the keys to the back door of the Wayne mansion. Being close to a member of the Wayne family came with its own dangers.

“You’re going to give yourself an ulcer.”

“Pardon?”

“Whatever you were thinking about, I could hear it generating acid to eat your stomach lining.”

“Ah.”

Bruce looked over at her and could see the dark circles. She had said she did not sleep well last night, due to her nightmares. He was aware she wasn’t telling him everything about her nightmares, though he figured she was entitled to share only as much as she was comfortable sharing. He would return the favor she so often offered him- he would not push.

“You should get some sleep.”

She nodded, though made no move to get off the couch or stop leaning her shoulder against Bruce’s.

“You may not be working early hours tomorrow, but you still might want to get a full eight hours of sleep.”

Victoria let out a long breath.

“I hate it when you’re right.”

Bruce half-smiled.

“Go to bed, I’ll head home.”

She rose with him from the couch, following him towards the door as he slid his shoes and jacket back on. He turned to find her holding his tie.

“Text me when you get home.”

He nodded, knowing better than argue.

“Don’t forget, you and Alfred have a dinner date to do some shopping for the Wayne Christmas Foundation.”

She offered a tired but warm smile.

“Wouldn’t miss it.”

Bruce nodded, then felt Victoria’s warm hand on his arm just before she leaned, giving him a hug.

“Stay safe.”

He nodded, moving to hug her back.

“Goodnight, Vic.”

She stepped back, letting him get out the door before she closed it behind him. As was his habit, he paused to wait and listen for her locking the handle, the regular dead bolt, and the bolt that went into the ceiling and floor. He had helped her install it when she moved in, with the idea to make her feel a little safer after the break-ins at her previous residence.

Bruce almost made it to his car before he heard the sirens. He checked his phone, pulling up the police scanner info. Hostage situation, three blocks down.

~^~^~^~^~^~

Bruce trudged up the stairs and into the back of the kitchen, finding Alfred finishing up a turkey wrap. He had been trying to get healthier options he could shove in Bruce’s direction after a patrol. From the smell, this one had some kind of spicy dressing in it.

As Alfred shoved the plate with two wraps and an apple, in Bruce’s direction, the phone rang. Alfred passed the plate as he muttered under his breath about French chefs. Bruce half-smiled as he moved off to grab some milk to go with the turkey wrap.

He was halfway through the second wrap before Alfred returned with a miserably grumpy expression. Bruce waited.

“I hate when your assistant, Valerie, decides to do French cuisine for the soiree.”

Bruce smiled around another bite of his wrap. Alfred had always been opinionated but ever since Valerie had taken over, trying to “swank up the place”, it seemed she was working him into a lather frequently over details of Wayne Enterprises Events.

“Does this woman not understand the point of the party is to be Thanksgiving? Autumn spices in the air, last harvest of the year, all about warmth ahead of the coming winter?”

Bruce shrugged as he finished the last bite. Alfred continued to rassafrass to himself as Bruce washed down the last of the wrap. He barely finished the glass before Alfred was relieving him of the two dishes and shoving a napkin at him. The man was still grumpy.

“I’ll talk to her, first thing in the morning.”

“No French chefs?”

Bruce nodded.

“No French chefs. No soiree. No swanky feng shui.”

“Good.”

“Maybe we’ll have apple and pumpkin pie.”, he tried to tease.

“At least some fall harvest type fair, and less Parisian cuisine.”

Bruce chuckled a little at the back of his throat as he passed behind Alfred. Being that it was the staff kitchen, it was tighter quarters yet both of them had always preferred it to the professional kitchen down the hall. It was homier, to use one of Vic’s words.

The upcoming event was a bit of a Thanksgiving party, among the higher ups at Wayne Enterprises. It was the third to last party of the year, with Christmas and New Year’s Eve being the final two. The Thanksgiving event had been his grandmother’s favorite, but the Christmas and New Year’s Eve parties had been his father’s favorites.

This year, Bruce had intended for them to be easy events that Valerie would plan, he would put his usual appearance in at, then he would duck out while Valerie kept things on track for the rest of the evening. It was a standing joke that Bruce never spent the entire evening in attendance of his own parties. He usually came late and always left early.

No one knew he was leaving to go be Batman. Everyone assumed it was him either being Mysterious or it was simply that he was an awkward, tragic rich boy who didn’t know how to handle people in groups. Bruce would never admit it, however there was some truth to the idea that he found the parties suffocating due to the comparisons to his father and grandfathers, the questions about his personal life, pestering about what he did with his free times, and the desire everyone seemed to have for getting him married to someone.

“Master Bruce?”

He turned to face Alfred. The butler, with his gold-rimmed spectacles, looked rather hesitant. He generally was not like that. Alfred never had an issue speaking or knowing his mind.

“Will you please stay at this event just a little longer? You don’t need to speak to every person in the room or live there at the front for everyone to talk to. Take a walk outside, sit on a balcony for a while, take breaks – but stay for the whole event.”

Bruce understood.

“You’ll need to get more accustomed to these events, if you’re going to run the company.”

Again, he nodded.

“If it is any consolation, Master Bruce, your father hated them too.”

That was… new.

“He always loved the Christmas and New Year’s Eve parties. He started planning them in May.”

Alfred nodded.

“That was your mum. She tolerated all the parties, except those two. Especially since your father introduced the cookie decorating competition and had several trees that only had lights on them and boxes of ornaments waiting for the guests to decorate. New Year’s, well, she was sentimental. The idea of closing a chapter and making a new start, she loved it.”

Bruce felt his throat tighten. His parents had always seemed to enjoy the glittering parties they attended, and hosted, throughout the year. It had never occurred to him that it had mostly been an act or that they might have only enjoyed certain parts.

“Like it or not, Master Bruce, you are the head of Wayne Enterprises, a figurehead of Gotham City, and one of the wealthier philanthropists in the country. People pay attention to you and take their cues from you.”

“I know.”

Coming closer, Alfred offered a sad look.

“They wouldn’t want you to spend all of your time out in the streets fighting, risking your life. They would want you to care for the family business and all it does, as well as for yourself.”

Bruce nodded before making a hasty retreat from the kitchen. His head was swimming with too many things and he really, really wanted to ruin a punching bag with his fists. Punching was much better than thinking, when his thinking was based upon emotions rather than calculations or deductions.

Alfred watched as the young, and now only, Wayne walked away. It seemed he had spent a lot of time having to tell Bruce things the young man did not want to hear, then having to sit back and let Bruce figure things out for himself.

He returned his attention to the meal he was cooking. It was a sauce that took twelve hours and he wanted it just right. He had not made it in a few years and he needed the practice. Alfred also needed the time to think.

~^~^~^~^~^~

Grissom looked through the papers. That cat-burglar, the woman, she had stolen the paperwork that proved who all Grissom had on his payroll. It was enough for him to get fried by the Feds if someone were to share the information with them.

He needed the evidence back, any copies she might have to be destroyed, and the cat dead. He also needed to get rid of the Batman. He was sure they were working together.

The Bat and the Cat. Grissom almost laughed. In a city full of weirdos, he had to get the two animal-inspired nutjobs with lofty ideals.

One of his top men, a loyal killer, joined Grissom in the main office. He had called his pet killer the moment he realized his men weren’t up to the job of taking on the Bat or smart enough to find the Cat.

“I don’t care what it costs, how many men you need, or who you squeeze. Find them. Get my papers back, destroy any digital or hard copies the Cat might have made, and then kill the both of them. Make an example out of them both. I want it to hurt.”

His killer nodded, a growing grin on their face.

“Yes, sir.”

Grissom’s hitter left. Grissom sank back into his comfortable chair, tumbler of scotch in hand as he slowly rotated his chair back in order to see the view of Gotham. His kingdom.

“All mine.”, he grinned as he toasted the city through the window.

~^~^~^~^~^~

September 25th. Victoria looked at the calendar as she was getting her things ready to leave the office. She had it all planned.

Get off work, grab the order she had placed at Olivaria’s via their website, drive out to Wayne manor, and make sure her favorite guys got a decent meal. Victoria didn’t hold out much hope of any more beyond the good dinner. She wasn’t really sure what else a friend could do on such an anniversary.

She barely reached the lobby door when she was stopped by her boss, Mr.Harrinton. The man had no chill and he was a stickler for deadlines. He was also the reason that his department of the Gazette never missed print time and had never successfully been challenged about the validity of their stories.

“Miss Vale! Miss Vale!”

She turned, stepping in a couple feet to meet her harried boss.

“Yes?”

“Did you turn in your article?”

“Two hours ago.”

“Oh.”, he said, perplexed and panting for breath, “I got a call saying they were missing the article downstairs.”

Victoria pulled out her phone, typing a few things.

“Give me a minute, I will send another copy. Don’t worry,” she added as she held up a hand to stop his questioning, “it’s formatted and everything.”

He smiled.

“I swear, Ms.Vale, someday you will be running this paper.”

“Not a chance, Mr.Harrinton.”, she said as she hit SEND.

He looked rather confused by her statement. Victoria smiled over at him.

“I’m a writer, not a boss.”

“I don’t know, you seem to take charge quite easily and capably. I’m sorry if I’m keeping you from some plans.”

“Just pickin’ up dinner for me and some friends. I do need to be going though.”

“Have a delicious dinner and a pleasant evening, Ms.Vale. Don’t forget to do some research on Grissom this weekend. Monday seems to be shaping up to be a real heavy news day, regarding the infamous mobster.”

“You too, Mr.Harrinton. And I will.”

She stepped through the door in time to get the ding on her phone to inform her Olivaria’s texted to let her know her meal was almost ready for pick-up. Victoria smiled. Despite the reason for tonight’s get-together, Victoria was always glad to see Bruce and Alfred.

Just under an hour later, she was walking into the kitchen door of Wayne manor with her arms laden with dinner. Alfred got the door for her, thanking her as she slid the bags onto the counter top. She had gotten mushroom and beef meat sauce lasagna for Alfred, chicken fetticini alfredo for Bruce, and grilled chicken on angel hair with marinara for herself.

As she was setting the dessert into the fridge, she looked over her shoulder at Alfred. He looked as she expected. The lines in his face seemed a little deeper today, the silver in his hair lacking it’s usual shine, and the sparkle of mischief in his bright eyes was entirely missing. Yet still, the kind smile remained.

“Thank you, Ms.Victoria.”

She reached, laying her hand on his arm as she smiled.

“How are you, Alfred?”

He shrugged one shoulder.

“As well as can be, I expect. Master Bruce is a bit more withdrawn than usual.”

Victoria nodded, then returned to unpacking the meal. When she and Alfred walked into the small dining room with plates and a pitcher of tea, Bruce was putting the finishing touches on the silverware. He looked up, offering a small smile.

Alfred smiled back at his ward, then moved about with the food as if this were a normal dinner, on any night, among friends. No gloomy anniversary or secrets, just a shared meal.

“Master Bruce, there is a plate of garlic knots and some butter in the kitchen.”

“Yes, sir.”

Victoria smiled. Sometimes she swore they were more like a very close uncle and nephew, rather than a butler and the kid he buttled for. She placed the pitcher at the center, in easy reach for all three of them once they would be seated, and was about to put Alfred’s plate down as Bruce returned.

Alfred smiled at the spread, then gave Victoria a nod. He had been the one to introduce her to Olivaria’s, for which Victoria would forever be grateful. Bruce pulled her chair for her and Alfred waited till she was seated before sitting down. Again, Victoria was struck by the level of good manners she encountered at the Wayne household.

“This smells wonderful.”, Alfred commented before digging in heartily, to his mushroom and beef lasagna.

In all honesty, Victoria would never turn down an invitation or excuse to eat with Alfred and Bruce. Her brothers lived far away, her mom had moved back to Virginia a couple years back after she grew weary of Gotham’s crime and grime, and her father was not someone she enjoyed spending time with. Coming over to sit at the smaller table in the staff area of the house, with Bruce and Alfred, was as close to a big, family dinner as she got.

“I was reading that the theatre downtown will have quite a selection of shows and performers this Christmas. All December long, they will be running two shows every Friday and Saturday, plus the one show a day Sunday through Thursday.”

Victoria nodded, considering what shows they might have, and what she might like to see.

“That stand-up comedian who does all the puns and holiday jokes, is on the line-up.”

That got a chuckle out of Victoria.

“I just might have to drag you out to see him with me, Alfred. I think you’ll enjoy it.”

Bruce listened as the two discussed what all they might go see this December. In the years he had been gone, the two had grown very close. At first, Bruce had been worried that Alfred would find Bruce’s company lacking compared to Victoria’s. She was bright and fun, where Bruce was moody and withdrawn.

Instead, Alfred had brought Bruce back in just like Bruce had been away at college for a few weeks. Victoria had backed off from the evening-long visits to the mansion for about a month. Alfred talked to her about it, and suddenly she was back to her regular visits and playing cards, checkers, and such with Alfred.

Bruce was glad to have his friend back, as well as Alfred. Even though Bruce was hiding so much from Victoria, he still felt that she was a rock for him. A touchstone, of sorts. Someone who helped keep him righted despite the tempest-tossing that Gotham did.

“What do you think Bruce, should we go to the show with Ms.Victoria?”, Alfred asked, cutting through Bruce’s musings.

“Remind me, which show?”

He saw Alfred’s taking note of how distracted he had been while Alfred and Victoria had been speaking. Alfred would be fussing over him later. Victoria had worry in her eyes, though she covered the rest of her expression fairly well.

“The family version of THE NUTCRACKER, that the Gotham City Deaf Community Performers, will be putting on. They will all perform using Sign, and a narrator will translate for the non-ASL speaking audience members.”

“Sounds interesting.”

“Good, then we’ll be joining her.”, Alfred said before turning back to his meal.

Bruce looked over to see where Victoria was shaking her head slightly, a fond smile on her lips. Bruce mentally slapped himself. He truly needed to stop paying so much attention to every microexpression on his friend’s face. He especially needed to make less of a habit of staring at her lips.

“Don’t worry, I won’t drag either of you to the performance they are doing of WHITE CHRISTMAS. Pretty sure I’m the only nerd who looks forward to that even in June.”


End file.
